Week 1

Readings

Digital Snaps
The New Face of Photography

Questions and Answers

1. The point of the article is to consider the change from 'old' to 'new' photography. It states that we need a happy in between of analogue and digital photography.

2. It discusses how photography has changed due to the internet and digital technologies, and the changing meaning of 'snapshots'.

3. Analogue photography is more about taking photos for a future audience, they are memories, whereas digital photography is about taking photos for the now, for present audiences, they are moments.

4. The affects of Web 2.0 on photography, where cameras and computers are linked and snapshot photography becomes huge with large quantities of photos taken and uploaded daily.

5. Amateur photography is not about taking photos as keepsakes or memories, it is more about photographing the world around us, in order to share and communicate with others.

6. All kind of aspects of society could influence the reading of a photo. A photo needs context. Some contexts are: who the photographer is (age, opinions, gender, culture), where the photo was taken, and why the photo was taken.

7. A social practise is the act of taking the photo to communicate. A networked technology is a technology that you network. A material object is the photo itself. An image is the subject of the photo.

8. They mean that more often ways to analyse photos are discussed, rather than talking about ways to take a photo and get it from A-B

9. I think it was interesting when they talked about individual photos loosing meaning, but photography as a whole, gaining meaning.

Some photos I took during the week

These photos are taken at a gig.

Research

At this stage, I am thinking about politics of the body as a subject to focus on. I haven't thought more in depth about what particular aspect of this huge topic I am interested in, but I think I want to take photos of people. I went to the library and looked through some of the photography books for inspiration. I found a book by Mona Kuhn called Native which is just beautiful. I will include a few of my most favourite photographs from this series.

I love the way she discusses nature and the body, and the beautiful way she has captured people.

I particularly love this set of two images side by side. The dappled light in both is so similar which I guess is why they were paired together.

Another photographer I looked at was Cecil Beaton, in a book called The New York Years. The photos that I liked from this book were mainly to do with people and mirrors. I love the idea of the reflection of someone telling a different story, and adding to the narrative.

"Mrs. Aileen Mehle, known as society columnist Suzy Knickerbocker, 1967."

I want this photo on my wall. I don't know what it is about it that captivates me, and captures my attention so wholeheartedly. The colours, the glamour, the streamers and the confetti. It is just so beautiful. It makes me want to be in this moment. I didn't include this image as a point of inspiration as the photography is not in a direction I want to go for this project, but I am including it for emotional inspiration. I want my photos to have emotion like this one does. I also love the editing.

"above: Julie Andrews, 1959."

"opposite. Tom Wolfe, 1969."

This image is really interesting as the mans face looks like it has a slightly different expression from each angle we see it from.

I also looked at the work of Laurent Elie Badessi, who is a French photographer. I picked up the book by them called Skin. The photographs are extremely interesting. The series is in the same vein as that of Mona Kuhn in Native, but Badessi takes it to a much less subtle level. Kuhn's work was soft and hazy; I would describe Badessi's as almost the opposite. The relationship of the body and nature is described more obviously in this work, and it is so beautiful and gritty.

'Female and male on wrinkles 2'

'Wrinkles on wrinkles'

'Female on wrinkles 1'